Monterey Bay

Conditions looked great so good friend and I decided we would fish the Santa Cruz, Ca area of the bay. It's very rare, but once in a great while I forget something. Ha. Today I forgot my camera bag. We were heading away from the docks and it hit me with a sinking feeling. At that point I knew we would capture some great specimans and have no way to share it. We headed up the coast to a place called Natrual Bridges state beach..Our plan was to start there and fish our way back. Right off the bat we were catching Black, Blue, Black & Yellow and Gopher rock fish. The drift was fast and really wasn't conducive to fly fishing so we stayed with light spinning and casting tackle with 6in swimbiats.

We ended the day with about 30 or so fish including some really nice blacks and beautiful Vermillion rock fish. As the day started winding down we set up a drift on a reef I like and I naled a 15lb California Halibut. After some thought I decided I wanted to harvest the fish. We kept at it looking for another and the Ling Cod started snapping swimbaits at a pretty good pace. Most were 18-22 inches and we were ok with it and having fun when I got slammed on the end of a long cast toward a kelp bed point. The fish felt heavy and had me down in the rocks and grass for a short time before she came up and went around the boat a couple of times. I slid a very nice Ling in the net. My personal best for sure. They get much much larger in Alaska, Canada and even here in California, but this is a respectable Califonria Ling Cod. Which, isn't a "Cod" at all but actually a member of the Sculpin family.Sorry, photos are not great quality! My appologies.